That was a vivid picture of how far we have to go to compete with the best of the Big 12. They beat us on both lines of scrimmage and had more speed and better skill players. We had several chances to stay in the game, but our QB's inability to execute on those opportunites turned a close game into a rout. Our defense was back on their heels and out of position in the 1st quarter, but rebounded to limit them to one big play and a FG set up by a bad snap in the middle two quarters. They were worn down and finally gave way in the 4th quarter. Clearly they were the better team, but if we could have converted more than one of the several pass opportunites to Herian and to Davies on the goal line, the game would been close to the end.

The Texas offense is very talented and diverse. I felt that they would throw on us, but I was disappointed that they ran on us, especially Benson. We obviously need better athletes to stop these kind of offenses, but we put our D in a bad spot because we couldn't move the ball at all. The Missouri game was bad because I felt that we had the better team and let down at the end and let the game get away. This was different -- we struggled all day to control their offense. We continued our pattern of takeaways, but Ruud's drop in the first quarter was unfortunate.

The offense was bad all day. I believe that the line is getting a bad rap. They didn't have a great day, but we ran into a 10 men in the box defense all day. We couldn't execute on the passes that were given to us and so we were run 2 and pass on 3rd and long. We don't have the line or the I-backs to run into a stacked defense, and we don't have a QB that can hit the passes that are there. But we ignore the bootleg package and ran wide and not straight at the defense where they are weakest. You can blame the blocking or the play-calling. But I know this much -- you have to be very good at what you do when the defense knows what is coming. I will say it again, we continue to play seniors in the backfield who are no more than adequate If we are going to struggle this much on offense, we might as well do with the young guys.

I wish I could tell you about some clever strategy that we should have employed, but without the athletes to execute, strategy won't work. The prime example is Herian behind their secondary all day and we convert only one into a score. Two things stand out to me: we must get better players to compete on this level, particularly I-back and QB. But the second, more disturbing, factor is the players discussing a lack of energy and fire during the game. This is not good in the biggest game of the year. It is one thing to lose to a better team; it is another to lose because you aren't ready to play. We play Kansas and their freshman QB who had a big game in his first start. We should have enough to win this one, and last two are toss-ups. But you can bet in all three we will see 10 in the box when we have the ball.